Episode 202: Jacob Vanator
On this episode of The Brad and Taylor Show, we sat down with Jacob Vanator of Vanator & Associates CPA!
To watch the full episode, check it out on YouTube below. In the meantime, here’s a transcript of the conversation…
Here’s what you missed from Jacob Vanator…
00:00:00:14 –> 00:00:03:17
Taylor: Welcome to the Brad and Taylor Show. Today, we have Jacob Vanator.
00:00:04:00 –> 00:00:15:03
Brad: You’re listening to The Brad and Taylor Show, a podcast that inspires entrepreneurs to pursue their passions. We’re sitting down with some of the best to learn how they got started and some lessons they learned along the way.
Taylor: Hey Jacob.
00:00:15:14 –> 00:00:20:03
Jacob: Hey, how are we doing? Glad to be here.
Taylor: Good. Yeah, you’re welcome.
00:00:20:05 –> 00:00:20:27
Brad: Awesome. Well, tell us a little bit about you. What do you do?
00:00:20:27 –> 00:01:20:13
Jacob: My official designation is a certified public accountant. I’m a CPA, it’s a well-known designation in the nation, created a long time ago to protect the interests of investors from companies that would take advantage of manipulating the books to try and make things better than they look. So investors would spend their money and, you know, oftentimes lose it. So that’s why the CPA designation was created, but I kind of specialize in a different practice, more known to people as tax preparation. I file taxes and I don’t interact with the practice that the CPA was created for so much, which is auditing. I interact more so with the IRS, which is another federal agency that everybody’s aware of and everybody’s trying to avoid. But yeah, I specialize in reducing people’s tax burden.
00:01:20:14 –> 00:02:09:11
So like, to go a little bit further than turbo tax might be where you just enter your stuff. But I specialize in navigating through the internal revenue code and the various regulations and whatnot and familiarizing myself with what’s going on so that I can help people reduce their tax burden. We call that a tax avoidance, which is very legal, a tax evasion, which is not the IRS encourages tax avoidance, which is sometimes a misnomer when we use it. When we see tax avoidance as a buzzword in the wall street journal or whatever. Nope. That’s very legal tax avoidance is really okay. Encouraging tax evasion is what we’re trying to do. So we, as professionals, balance that line, we try to get as close to as possible to the lowest tax burden that we can and carry our client through that.
00:02:09:11 –> 00:02:10:13
Taylor: So this is your busy time of year then, right?
00:02:10:19 –> 00:02:49:19
Jacob: We’re ramping up. Yes. February 1st is more or less the official start of tax season. But we’re getting ready. We’re getting the software where you’re doing all the conferences we’re doing at the end, getting everybody ready to file those tax returns, and seeing all the work that we’ve done in preparation, you know, pan out. And hopefully, the IRS accepts our work and we get to move forward. If not, then we start the whole process of chasing them down to prove we’re right. You know, so no, we have a good time with it, but yes, we’re getting ready. It’s ramping up. It’s still kind of the slow season, but it’s definitely coming to an end and everybody can feel it.
00:02:50:03 –> 00:02:55:12
Taylor: Yeah. Awesome. How long have you been in this business? I know it’s a family business. How long have you been doing it?
00:02:55:21 –> 00:03:26:20
Jacob: Personally, I have two years, put in as a tax accountant is what my business card says, but I worked with my parents before I went to college to become a CPA and whatnot. And I did a couple of seasons with them as a secretary and all the other odds and ends that a family business needs to fill. There’s always a need for something to be done. But yeah. So in total, I’ve probably put in somewhere close to four years. But as a tax accountant, two years.
00:03:26:20 –> 00:03:28:19
Taylor: That’s awesome. So how long has the business been around?
00:03:28:25 –> 00:03:57:17
Jacob: So my dad has owned the business for 30 years or close to it. But the K and K accounting, which is what an associate’s CPA used to be known as, was in place for like 30 or 35, 40 years before that. So in total of the businesses over seven years and before that, the building we were in was a fire department. So yeah. It’s been a good deal.
00:03:58:08 –> 00:04:03:09
Taylor: Your dad, you, and then you have a brother, right? And it’s the three of you who are in business together?
00:04:04:12 –> 00:04:46:06
Jacob: Yeah. And there’s a couple of others up and coming. Joey and I went to high school with Josiah Wolf, who’s also an upcoming CPA. And then there are several other people in the firm that make it all go, and we couldn’t do it without them. So you know, we’re really glad that everybody’s there. But yes, Joey, Josiah, myself, and my father. It’s kind of interesting how the firm’s transformed in the last couple of years because for most of my father’s career, he was the only guy there with a license, and then up and coming, we’re going to have four here really quickly. And then, you know, who knows where we’ll go after that, just really excited to share the workload a little bit.
00:04:46:07 –> 00:04:51:04
Taylor: How long was he doing that for? Without any help?
00:04:52:08 –> 00:05:29:01
Jacob: Up until recently. I mean, yeah, he’s been doing something and I think we did close to 1200 returns last year and he reviewed them all. So you know, he keeps it together. And the goal is, you know, we put an article in the newspaper talking about our, well, he put an article in a newspaper a couple of years ago talking about his retirement plan and all of us were in that article or whatever, but he is not looking to just disappear. So it was folks in rabbits that are worried about John Vanator disappearing and he’s not gonna, he’s just gonna work last. That’s the goal.
00:05:29:14 –> 00:05:30:13
Taylor: Retirement. Yeah.
00:05:30:13 –> 00:05:32:00
Jacob: Retirement. Right, exactly.
00:05:32:18 –> 00:05:42:08
Taylor: We’ll be heightened by it, but absolutely. Yeah. When you’re a busy workman, I don’t know if you can ever fully step away. My family is the same way.
00:05:42:26 –> 00:06:13:20
Jacob: Yeah. Well, and that’s the thing, he is the owner, so there’s real ownership there. Obviously, you know, we talk a lot about that and culture in college. They talked about how, as you develop a leader, you take ownership, but while he’s these, the owner, you know, it’s like, it’s a real thing. He takes it very seriously. And so the likelihood of him ever, it’s kind of like a pastor that’s been there for 50 years and he didn’t just leave. Usually, those guys get carried out in a coffin, so it’s like, you know, it’s his ministry too. So that’s another thing.
00:06:14:01 –> 00:06:18:15
Taylor: Nice. So you guys are located in Eaton Rapids, have you guys always been in Eaton Rapids?
00:06:18:29 –> 00:07:20:23
Jacob: We had a brief stint and all of that, where we had a satellite office there, but that didn’t work out for a couple of reasons. But yeah, the main office has been in Eaton Rapids forever. And as we go forward, COVID specifically issued several changes in our office, specifically. It impacted everybody, but specific changes in our office. We’ve been able to offer online services now, so people can send us stuff and talk on the phone or via zoom call or whatever it is. A lot of monetization has happened so that we can deal with clients wherever they’re at. So that’s awesome. Geographically constricted accounting surfaces are a thing of the past, even for small businesses like ourselves, you know, previous two years ago, three years ago, we personally would have thought those types of things were unavailable to us. You know you hear about that. Like the big firms, Plante Moran and PWC and all these other places, they could do that stuff. But yeah, I mean, we don’t have the money to support that type of infrastructure, but it’s becoming very accessible for us now. And we’re glad to be able to provide those types of services.
00:07:20:23 –> 00:07:23:23
Taylor: That’s awesome. So you guys can have clients locally and if they move away, they can still be your client.
00:07:23:23 –> 00:08:27:02
Jacob: Oh yeah. A hundred percent. Very easy to, I mean, yeah, it’s no trick at all these days, you know, because, and it’s all about security. Everything’s about security these days. And the people that we work with to provide the services we do are really concerned about that. And so our software companies are interested in increasing that security. Everything from our email provider to the IT manager that puts everything together. It’s all about security. And so now we have been able to create a system that we’re comfortable with the security level to offer those outside services. So people can send us secure information, not worried about someone reading their W2 or whatever, losing the 10 40 in the mail or something like that, which happened a lot last year, mailing 10 forties out for people to sign or whatever is thinking in the past. So yeah, no, it’s, it’s exciting, it’s an exciting time to be an up and coming accountant, which is kind of a weird thing to say who wants to be open to company accountant, but I am, that’s where I find myself.
00:08:28:04 –> 00:08:35:19
Taylor: When you were younger, Jacob, did you want to be this when you grew up? You know, from a young age, like, yes, I’m going to follow in my dad’s footsteps. This is what I’m going to do.
00:08:35:26 –> 00:08:43:09
Jacob: So it’s, that’s an interesting question because I mean the short answer is no.
00:08:43:19 –> 00:08:45:12
Taylor: Five-year-old Jacob is going to be an accountant.
00:08:45:13 –> 00:09:23:10
Jacob: Yeah. Right. Like he’s sitting in the kindergarten classroom and all the pictures of all the people, you know, you’ve got the firemen and policemen or whatever. And then on the very end, you’ve got the weird guy with the green visor and the black sleeve. And you’re like, oh, I want to be that guy. Like, no, I mean, no, of course not. But what happened was, as I considered, you know, throughout my educational career, all the things I could. I’m good with my hands. So I thought, well, engineer, a doctor makes sense with that, or I like to teach. So maybe professor or minister, something like that, it’s things I’m passionate about. The question for my father was always, you can do whatever you want.
00:09:23:11 –> 00:10:09:22
There were never any handcuffs, which I really appreciated about his leadership style. But consider the trajectory of your life and consider what this business might well consider what this business has done for me and indirectly for you and what it might do for you in the future. And so that’s a whole lot of consideration. But it ended up that both my brother and I decided that this was the best trajectory to walk down. And I think it’s the best way that we’ve been able to serve the people that we’d like to serve. We were raised this way. We were raised talking about finances and tax and how to combine financial knowledge with a concern for the customer. Take care of them, take care of the people and the money will take care of itself.
00:10:09:23 –> 00:10:38:00
You know, the stuff, just nuggets like that from the master account. And we grew upright, my father. So it became very natural to follow that track. And one of the things I’ve been asked is like, would you change? Would you go in another direction? If you knew what you knew now or then what you knew now? And I don’t really think I’ve considered a lot of things, spent a lot of time thinking about, is this the way that I want to go? And I really believe it is.
00:10:38:25 –> 00:10:43:05
Taylor: Oh yeah. And it’s awesome that you guys are a family business too. I bet your dad’s proud of that.
00:10:43:07 –> 00:11:03:23
Jacob: Yeah, he is. I mean, sometimes a little bit much, he does you know, he beams and you can see the rays coming through his office. So it’s like, he’s really happy that we’re all there and we have a good rapport but don’t get the wrong impression sometimes working with family isn’t the easiest thing, you know, but we do have a good time doing it.
00:11:04:17 –> 00:11:14:06
Taylor: Yeah, that’s awesome. Did you get any advice from your dad when you let him know that this is the path you were going to go on? Did he ever give you any advice that stuck with you?
00:11:15:06 –> 00:12:02:15
Jacob: I mean, yeah, absolutely. Innumerable, I mean, I’m formed by all of the things that it’s hard to point out just one thing because most of the words that flow through my mind are in one way or another connected to the many canned speeches that my dad gave. That’s the other thing. It’s interesting because he’ll have like five clients in a day or six. Wow. I guess during tax season, you might have as many as eight, but, you know, so all of us are sitting in our offices or whatever, listening to my dad do his discourse. And it’s funny because he’ll have the same conversation eight times a day. It’s like, he’ll pull one of his cans off the shelf and that’s what he’s talking about today, but you know, so being his son, you get inundated with that type of material.
00:12:02:18 –> 00:12:46:21
But what it is is an ability and a discourse to connect with the people that we’re serving, right. Accounting is much less about the numbers and it is so much more about the care and concern we portray towards the clients. We really do care that either their personal lives or their business or whatever we’re involved with, we really want them to do well. We really do and because if they don’t, it’s somehow reflective upon us, as well, that’s not going to be good for us either. So as a fiduciary, which means that before any fees or any compensation comes our way, we were first concerned with the well-being of the client. And so again, take care of the people and the money will take care of itself.
00:12:46:22 –> 00:13:31:05
That’s probably more than anything as I enter the business world and I’m 24 years old. I’ve got a long way to go, but as I entered the business world, that more than anything else changed how I view my work. Because it isn’t about making more money. Now, when I considered which profession I went to, obviously that was a consideration that trajectory I’m talking about is a financial trajectory. It’s a great way to go, but it’s how we treat people. It’s how we interact with people and how we take care of the people that we do come in contact with clients. And I think that’s very true in all businesses.
Oh yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. Take care of your clients and the money will follow. Yeah. Right. You know, first-serve then be compensated, not look for compensation first.
00:13:31:12 –> 00:14:05:29
Right? Yeah. All that stuff came from my phone. Look, of course, affirmed by all the other business leaders that I read about in college and whatnot. I’m like, so I learned that my dad wasn’t an idiot. Yay. He knows what he’s talking about because all these other people confirm it. But other than that, everything is steeped in the information that my father grew up with and that’s probably why I’m a little bit biased when I did make the decision. I did. What, what career, you know, cause he had first picked on what advice I listened to because I listened to him, you know, but it turned out well, so that’s awesome.
00:14:06:02 –> 00:14:12:24
Brad: So as we get into the tax season, what is one thing that someone should prepare for before getting? How does someone prepare to come to see you?
00:14:13:11 –> 00:15:06:28
Jacob: Okay. So there’s, well, I’d read, it depends on what that person is doing. Right. So in complexity, it goes from a W2 employee to a thriving business owner. I mean, and you know, there can be a whole bunch of things in between that. If a person has sold their house, if a person, worked for another person for a short period of time, if someone has some investments, if they’re new into Bitcoin, if they’re any time, there has a chance that there’s a gain or there’s some type of income available, we need to know about it, whether it’s cash or check or whatever, there is a common misnomer that if someone receives some type of payment, it’s just cash and there’s no reporting done that that doesn’t need to be reported to the IRS.
00:15:06:28 –> 00:15:51:08
Well, I mean, is the IRS gonna know about it? No. Like there’s no way for, there’s no underlying reporting for that. But I mean, the IRS clearly states that that is reportable income, any income you receive is reportable income. So for someone to sit and tell us that they, you know, anyway, that’s a whole other thing, but you know, either don’t tell me or whatever, but when you’re in your preparation. It’s tough. Right. So that’s a situation we often find ourselves in as prepared. It’s like, oh yeah, I made $4,000 this year babysitting. I was paid in cash. It’s like, why did you tell me that? You know, but you know, that type of thing, preparing, collecting K one’s collecting, W2’s collecting 10 90 nines either from the bank or from your investments or whatever.
00:15:51:08 –> 00:16:38:17
All that. A lot of times people collect those and just a big folder and they’ll either send them to us in the mail or they’ll email all the documents that they got from various institutions. It’s really great nowadays, because most of those, we call them matching documents because anytime you receive a 10 99, a W2, uh, or any other type of form, you get to report income. There are two documents, one gets sent to the IRS directly and one gets sent to you and the IRS wants you to take all those documents and compile them on a 10 40 or your tax return and then send it to the IRS. And then the IRS takes all the documents they’ve already received, compares it to your 10 40, and then says, oh, it’s all there. Or, oh, you’re missing something, you know, and then you get the letter, and then it’s okay.
00:16:38:17 –> 00:17:49:14
Now you have to come back and see me and we, you know, and also stuff. So keeping track of the income that flows to you, and then the documentation related to that income is really important. Because you know, a lot of the times someone might think that, well, this wasn’t reportable, or this is reportable or whatever. It’s like best practice, send it all to me and I’ll help you figure out what is and what is not necessary for your tax return. So in preparation, that’s that, and then for, you know, for business owners, especially a lot of people read home, you know, over the last year or whatever, and they were trying to figure out what they’re going to do with their time or whatever. And they decided to sell something on eBay or create a craft company or start doing whatever it is. Those shipped businesses. That’s a big thing nowadays, going to shop for people who don’t want to go shopping because of whatever. That’s a whole nother capital worms and whatnot, and be more than glad to help you walk those things, but there’s more complicated than most people realize.
00:17:49:14 –> 00:17:50:10
Brad: That’s awesome. So how can people get a hold of you guys?
00:17:50:26 –> 00:17:58:29
Jacob: So you can either give us a call that’s (517) 663-4204 or visit our website.
00:17:59:08 –> 00:18:24:14
Brad: Sweet. Hey, thanks. Thanks for coming on. Sharing your story with us today.
Jacob: Yeah, absolutely.
Hello. Hello. Are you there? Are there, are there, Hey guys, we just wanted to thank you for listening on either a podcast or on the YouTube video here. If you guys wanted to subscribe, that would be awesome. That would mean a lot to us. If you guys could give us a five-star review as well, that would be amazing. And we’ll see you on the next one.
Check out Jacob Vanator:
vanatoraccounting.com/
Facebook: @Vanator-Associates-CPA-248881688976366
If you loved this episode subscribe so you never miss one! Want more Brad and Taylor content? Head over to our blog.